Comment Re:Oh great (Score 1) 325
Frodo isn't in The Hobbit. It involves Bilbo's adventures.
Comment wait... (Score 1) 705
Touch typing classes aren't mandatory everywhere? I was forced to take some in grades 6, 8 and 9 (I was supposed to take one in grade 7 as well, but I got out of it). They were pretty pointless by the fourth class.
Comment Re:Shooting themselves in the foot (Score 3, Insightful) 114
It probably doesn't matter much to the Chinese government that foreigners view the administration with disdain, as long as Chinese nationals view the administration with respect and trust.
Especially if they can pass off any negative foreign views of China as being an anti-Chinese bias.
Especially if they can pass off any negative foreign views of China as being an anti-Chinese bias.
Submission + - Astronomers Say Dying Sun Will Engulf Earth
iamlucky13 writes: A minor academic debate among astronomers is the final fate of the earth. As the sun ages and enters the red giant stage of its life, it will heat up, making the earth inhospitable. It will also expand, driven by helium fusion so that its outer layers reach past the earth's current orbit. Previously it had been believed that the sun would lose enough mass to allow earth to escape to a more distant orbit, lifeless but intact. However, new calculations, which take into account tidal forces and drag from mass shed by the sun, suggest that the earth will have sufficiently slowed in that time to be dragged down to its utter destruction in 7.6 billion years. It looks like the earth destruction manual can update Fallback Method 3 with the good news.
DOE Awards 265 Million Processor-Hours To Science Projects 59
Weather Storm writes "DOE's Innovative and Novel Computational Impact on Theory and Experiment (INCITE) program supports computationally intensive, large-scale research projects at a governmental level. They recently awarded 265 million processor-hours to 55 scientific projects, the largest amount of supercomputing resource awards donated in the DOE's history and three times that of last year's award. The winners were chosen based on their potential breakthroughs in the areas of science and engineering research, and the suitability of the project for using supercomputers. This year's INCITE applications ranged from developing nanomaterials to advancing the nation's basic understanding of physics and chemistry, and from designing quieter cars to improving commercial aircraft design. The next round of the INCITE competition will be announced this summer. Expansion of the DOE Office of Science's computational capabilities should approximately quadruple the 2009 INCITE award allocations to close to a billion processor hours."
Feed Wired: Macaques Use Grooming as Payment for Sex (wired.com)
Submission + - Wonder Woman Gets a Woman's Point-of-View
theodp writes: "Traditionally, comics have been by, for and about men. But more and more women are breaking into the traditional boys' club. Beginning with Wonder Woman #14, the superhero's tale is being told Gail Simone. It's a break from nearly 66 years of being written for the most part by men, which may surprise some old and new Ms. Magazine readers."
Submission + - Scientists Able to Make Fuel from CO2 and Sunlight (wired.com)
An anonymous reader writes: Wired.com reports that scientists at Sandia National Laboratories are creating a prototype of a system that will be able to synthesize methanol and gasoline using sunlight and carbon dioxide: "The Sunlight to Petrol, or S2P, project essentially reverses the combustion process, recovering the building blocks of hydrocarbons. They can then be used to synthesize liquid fuels like methanol or gasoline. Researchers said the technology already works and could help reduce greenhouse-gas emissions, although large-scale implementation could be a decade or more away... Lab experiments have shown that the process works, Stechel said. The researchers hope to finish a prototype by April... The Sandia team envisions a day when CR5s are installed in large numbers at coal-fired power plants. Each of them could reclaim 45 pounds of carbon dioxide from the air daily and produce enough carbon monoxide to make 2.5 gallons of fuel. Coupling the CR5 with CO2 reclamation and sequestration technology, which several scientists already are pursuing, could make liquid hydrocarbons a renewable fuel, Stechel said."
Submission + - How long now...?
KevReedUK writes: Our "Friends" over at ZDNet appear to be eulogising over the upcoming death of physical media sales. In their article here they refer to the noticeable drop in physical sales of albums whilst digital sales continue climbing (albeit at a reduced rate).
Normally, this would be a case of "Nothing to see here...", save for their assertion that one of the key reasons for the music industry's slowdown is piracy. Is it just me, or is this a bit of a stretch?
Normally, this would be a case of "Nothing to see here...", save for their assertion that one of the key reasons for the music industry's slowdown is piracy. Is it just me, or is this a bit of a stretch?
Submission + - Wired: RIAA's 'misspeaking' affected verdict
NewYorkCountryLawyer writes: David Kravetz of Wired.com, who covered the Capitol v. Thomas trial gavel-to-gavel and in person, writes that the RIAA's recent statement — that SONY BMG's top litigation lawyer "misspoke" during the trial when she said that making a copy from one's own cd is "stealing" — may have caused a major "miscarriage of justice". Wired points out that later on in the trial, during the RIAA's examination of Ms. Thomas, "On the hard drive she [turned] over were thousands of songs Thomas said she ripped from her CDs. The RIAA's Gabriel suggested to jurors that copying one's purchased music was a violation of the Copyright Act. Gabriel, for example, asked Thomas whether she had ever burned CDs, either for herself, or to give away to friends. "Did you get permission from the copyright owners to do that?" Gabriel asked.
"No," Thomas responded."
Gabriel, the RIAA's lead attorney, apparently misspoke too — prejudicing jurors along the way.
Submission + - SPAM: A crystal as beautiful as a diamond
Roland Piquepaille writes: "Why are diamonds so shiny and beautiful? A Japanese mathematician says it's because of their unique crystal structure and two key properties, called 'maximal symmetry' and 'strong isotropic property.' According to the American Mathematical Society (AMS), he found that out of all the crystals that are possible to construct mathematically, just one shares these two properties with the diamond. So far, his K4 crystal exists only as a mathematical object. And nobody knows if it exists — or if it can be synthesized. So will we say one day "A K4 Crystal Is Forever"? Read more for additional references and a picture of the beautiful K4 crystal."
Feed Science Daily: Why Do Some Animals Live Longer Than Others? (sciencedaily.com)
Why do some live longer than others? Researchers turned to tropical African butterflies to find the answer. In the field, the temperature experienced by the caterpillar sets up the butterfly to become the form that matches the season. This is called phenotypic plasticity, and in this species it has evolved as a response to the alternating seasons.
Submission + - The 5 Coolest Hacks of '07
ancientribe writes: Nothing was sacred to hackers in '07 — not cars, not truckers, and not even the stock exchange. Dark Reading reviews five wild hacks that went after everyday things we take for granted even more than our PC's — our car navigation system, a trucker's freight, WiFi connections, iPhone, and (gulp) the electronic financial trading systems that record our stock purchases and other online transactions.
http://www.darkreading.com/document.asp?doc_id=142127&WT.svl=news1_2
http://www.darkreading.com/document.asp?doc_id=142127&WT.svl=news1_2
Submission + - "You Don't Understand Our Audience" (technologyreview.com)
MBCook writes: "Technology Review has a fantastic seven page piece titled "You Don't Understand Our Audience" (printer version, summed up by Ars) by former Dateline correspondent John Hockenberry. In it he discusses how NBC (and the networks at large) has missed and wasted opportunities brought by the Internet; and how they work to hard to get viewers at the expense of actual news. The story describes various events such as turning down a report on who al-Qaeda is for a reality show about firefighters, having to tie a story about a radical student group into American Dreams, and the failure to cover events like Kurt Cobain suicide (except as an Andy Rooney complaint piece)."
Submission + - USA Government To Release Electronic Passport soon (xuecast.com)
XueCast writes: "http://www.xuecast.com/?p=430, United States Of America's Department of State has announced that they will release the new electronic Passport cards in either April or May 2008. The cards will have computer chips in them, and these chips would be used to store informations and they could also be read wirelessly or remotely from up to 20 feet away, which could reduce the waiting time at border checkpoints.
Deputy Assistant Secretary Of State For Passport Services, Ann Barrett in an interview said that : " As people are approaching a port of inspection, they can show the card to the reader, and by the time they get to the inspector, all the information will have been verified and they can be waved on through. ""
